Mortality and morbidity among military personnel and civilians during the 1930s and World War II from transmission of hepatitis during yellow fever vaccination: Systematic review

R.E. Thomas, D.L. Lorenzetti and W. Spragins

American Journal of Public Health, 2013, vol. 103, issue 3, e16-e29

Abstract: During World War II, nearly all US and Allied troops received yellow fever vaccine. Until May 1942, it was both grown and suspended in human serum. In April 1942, major epidemics of hepatitis occurred in US and Allied troops who had received yellow fever vaccine. A rapid and thorough investigation by the US surgeon general followed, and a directive was issued discontinuing the use of human serum in vaccine production. The large number of cases of hepatitis caused by the administration of this vaccine could have been avoided. Had authorities undertaken a thorough review of the literature, they would have discovered published reports, as early as 1885, of postvaccination epidemics of hepatitis in both men and horses. It would take 4 additional decades of experiments and epidemiologicalresearchbefore viruses of hepatitis A, B, C,D, andEwere identified, their modes of transmission understood, and their genomes sequenced.

Keywords: yellow fever vaccine, Cuba; female; hepatitis B; Hepatitis B virus; history; human; jaundice; male; military medicine; mortality; Panama; review; soldier; statistics; United States; virus hepatitis; war, Cuba; Female; Hepatitis B; Hepatitis B virus; Hepatitis, Viral, Human; History, 19th Century; History, 20th Century; Humans; Jaundice; Male; Military Medicine; Military Personnel; Panama; United States; World War II; Yellow Fever Vaccine (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2012.301158_9

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2012.301158

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